De Ontmoeting wants to develop a bilingual Integral Child Centre in two years, in cooperation
with Royal Kids Home, for the following reasons:

• Babies and young children are the most capable of acquiring a second language. The sooner they start acquiring a second language, the easier and more natural their language development will be.
• Integral Child Centres fit within the current social trends because of the collaborative character, the relief of parents and the uninterrupted learning line.
• A continuous bilingual line is easy to realise within an ICC, because there is mutual coordination about learning activities and the transfer of information.
• The cooperation partners believe that bilingualism (Dutch / English) is an added value for the child of the future. A child entering the labour market in 2030 will find a society where English will have a prominent place. Also, in secondary education, children will benefit from bilingual education at primary school.
• The IKC wants to contribute to the development of children's world citizenship through internationalisation and understanding of cultural differences.
   

The emerging literacy of babies

The language development of new-borns starts with development of the senses. Senses such as hearing, seeing, oral motor skills and the sense of touch form the basis for speech development (Burkhardt Montanari, 2004). Neural networks develop within the brain, which starts to shape the brain. This is the beginning of cognitive development. Together, these skills and developments are essential for learning new languages.

From about three months, a baby produces sounds that gradually become vague with consonants. When a child is about six months old, he or she attunes the sound production to the environment and the accent arises (Goorhuis-Brouwer, 2014)..

The emerging literacy of toddlers

Burkhardt Montanari (2004) distinguishes four phases that children go through in language acquisition:

1. In the pre-language phase from 0 to 1 years-old, babies listen to sounds and noises;
2. Between thirteen and eighteen months, children speak their first words in the early
   language phase from 1 to 2.5 years old. The development of sounds is almost finished,
   and toddlers understand simple and singular tasks. The two-word phase (18 - 24 months)
   can arise because children understand that you can put words one after the other and
   they know the meaning of those words (Goorhuis-Brouwer, 2014). Van der Linden &
   Kuiken (2012) emphasize the big step from one-word sentences to the two-word phase;
   children not only develop a vocabulary, but also gain an understanding of grammar.
3. In the differentiation phase from 2.5 to 4 years old, toddlers start constructing sentences,
   their vocabulary increases, and they understand simple stories. In this phase, children
   use combinations of nouns, verbs, prepositions and demonstrative pronouns.
4. From about 4 - 5 years the completion phase starts. The syntax of the sentences is more
   complex, the vocabulary expands further, and the motor skills of speech are refined.
   Language and thinking are closely linked, but the socio-emotional development is also
   linked to language expression.
   Toddlers can be stimulated in their language by naming pictures and objects, singing
   songs, reading aloud and working together (Goorhuis-Brouwer, 2014).
   In summary, the phase of emerging literacy is the period in which speaking and listening
   skills are formed. This oral communication is the basis of written language skills
   (Verhoeven & Aarnoutse, 1999).

Emerging literacy in groups 1 to 3

In the completion phase a total process is created in which a toddler develops everything at the same time: speaking, thinking, perception and motor- and social skills (Goorhuis-Brouwer, 2014). The relative simplicity of emerging literacy gives way to a complex beginning literacy, in which attention is paid to (further) orientation towards written language, the functional application of language, making connections between oral and written language use, metal linguistic awareness (thinking about language), phonemic awareness (language consists of sounds) and learning elementary reading acts (Verhoeven & Aarnoutse, 1999). These mentioned parts of language development are described in the intermediate objectives for beginning literacy.

Intermediate goals are goals that describe the desired outcome of developmental and learning processes. They refer to final objectives, in this case to the final objectives of primary education. Final objectives are objectives to be achieved at the end of primary school (Verhoeven & Aarnoutse, 1999, p. 12). The intermediate objectives are independent from the year class system and can be used flexibly, linked to the continuous learning line, whereby it can be taken into account that the intermediate objectives of initial literacy are completed approximately at the end of group 3. Because of the cyclical nature of the intermediate objectives, they return at a higher level each year in groups 1 to 3.

Simultaneous language acquisition

Children can acquire a second language in two ways, through simultaneous or successive language acquisition. By simultaneous language acquisition we mean learning a second language from the birth of a child. In simultaneous language acquisition, children learn two languages separately from each other; they develop a separate system for each language (Gielen & Işҫi, 2015). The acquisition of a second language is largely the same as the language acquisition of monolingual children. The vocabulary for each language lags slightly behind that of monolingual children, but they know enough words to be able to participate at school and during primary school this difference is rectified (Van der Linden & Kuiken, 2012). Another difference is
the linguistic mix that occurs when acquiring two languages. In the first phase, a child uses separate words from the two language systems (also called codes). Gielen & Işҫi (2015) call this mixing code change. In the second stage, children can merge words from two language systems into two-word sentences. Around three years of age, the third stage takes place in which children can transfer grammar from one language system to another, for example: 'I'm jumping' (Goorhuis-Brouwer, 2014) and discover that they use two different codes (Verhoeven, 1994)

Successive language acquisition

When children first acquire their mother tongue and learn a second language at a later stage, this is referred to as successive language acquisition. This second language acquisition is different from the acquisition of the mother tongue. In the first language, children go through the previously mentioned stages of frontal-, early-, differentiation- and completion-, thus building up a language system. Second language acquisition builds on this system and therefore does not have a parallel second language system. In successive language acquisition, children skip the pre- and early language phases and construct grammar, vocabulary and phonology on their mother tongue. There is thus a transfer of new information to existing knowledge, with which the importance of a good command of the mother tongue is essential (Gielen & Işҫi, 2015). Children
who acquire a second language often first go through a quiet period in which they receptively absorb the language, but do not yet produce it (Gielen & Işҫi, 2015 / Bodde-Alderlieste & Schokkenbroek, 2011). Learning a second language preferably takes place in the languagesensitive period (0 - 7 years), because at that point there is still overlapping brain activity. If this is not the case, it is best to wait until after the tenth year before acquiring a second language, because at that age the mother tongue will be at a level where the second language requires a conscious thought and translation process.

CLIL: Content and Language Integrated Learning

Content Language and Integrated Learning (CLIL) is a didactic form of language-oriented
vocational education, in which subjects are taught in a second language.

CLIL has four didactic goals: subject, language, attitude and internationalisation goals, which are
called the four C's in English: Content, Cognition, Communication and Culture (Coyle, Hood &
Marsh, 2010). Primary school de Ontmoeting works with CLIL from group 1 onwards; in the first
four years there is pre-school CLIL with an emphasis on playful learning.

In addition to the collaboration with Royal Kids Home, de Ontmoeting also has contacts with the
Comenius College for secondary education. In mutual consultation they discuss the ongoing
(bilingual) line from primary to secondary education.s.